AN AIREBOROUGH children’s charity has been awarded a £4,000 grant from Comic Relief.

The money will be used to help parents with mental health problems.The funding, from Comic Relief’s Covid-19 Community Fund has been given to ACTION (Aireborough Children’s Trust In Our Neighbourhood), a registered charity which supports the work of Aireborough Children’s Centre.

A spokesman said: “We have been extremely fortunate to receive a grant from the Comic Relief COVID-19 Community Fund (England). The grant bid was to enable us to tackle the ongoing and detrimental effect of parental mental health within our area and this is what the grant will be used for. As a result of the grant award, we have been able to secure the services of a professional parent counsellor until April 2021.

“Aireborough Children’s Centre operates to support children and their families within the area holistically. They are a small service and are striving to provide the best start in life for children and also to provide the support parents need.

"Targets for the last three years have been based around parental mental health as this makes up 47 per cent of their referrals and they have struggled with this over this time due to the lack of suitable services within our area.

“The aim of the Comic Relief COVID-19 Community Fund (England) is to support local grassroots organisations to respond to the needs of vulnerable individuals, families and communities during the COVID-19 crisis and recover from the impact COVID-19 has had on their services.

"The new fund has been made available with funds raised by the British public through The Big Night In appeal and match funding from Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport. The fund is for organisations who deliver activities against at least one of Comic Relief’s themes: Children Survive and Thrive; Fighting for Gender Justice; A Safe Place to Be; and Mental Health Matters."

ACTION Chairman, Bob Banks, said: “As a result of the pandemic, mental health issues have been a major problem nationally, and ACTION were delighted to have been awarded this grant to provide counselling in Aireborough. Without organisations like Comic Relief it would be difficult to fund counselling provision to those in need of this type of service.”

The Comic Relief COVID-19 Community Fund (England) is administered by the charity, Groundwork UK.

Nation chief executive Graham Duxbury said: “We are pleased that the Comic Relief COVID-19 Community Fund (England) is making a difference to those in need and helping to support vulnerable communities at this uncertain time.”